


Burying the Past

by weakinteraction



Category: Star Wars (Marvel Comics)
Genre: F/F, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-20
Updated: 2016-11-20
Packaged: 2018-08-31 20:39:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8592691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/weakinteraction/pseuds/weakinteraction
Summary: Aphra and Sana are drawn together again by a mission for Grakkus the Hutt.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [olio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/olio/gifts).



The bar had one of the worst reputations on Nar Shaddaa, which was saying something. Aphra liked it that way, but she had her own reasons for coming her night after night.

She sat in the booth in the corner of the bar, nursing her drink. It was busy and noisy -- a high stakes match at the sabacc table was attracting a lot of attention -- but the regulars knew better by now than to bother her. She was busy with her own personal archaeology. As she drained her glass, she went deeper back through the layers of the recent past.

The first and last times she'd seen Sana had both been at this very table. The memories came back, unbidden, almost like watching a holo re-enactment, or a pair of ghosts haunting her: Sana, in memory her stark beauty even more striking, and Aphra ... Aphra as she had been.

The first time, Sana had been sat where Aphra was now, and Aphra had been at the bar, until--

_Aphra screwed up her courage and walked over to the corner table. "I need a ship."_

_"You need to work on your pick up lines." At Aphra's shocked expression, Sana continued, "You've been staring at me all night. You can't blame me for thinking you're interested in more than a ride." An amused expression flashed across her face. "Or more than one sort of ride, at least."_

_"Captain Starros--"_

_"Oh, please, call me Sana."_

_"I heard your ship is one of the fastest in the galaxy."_

_"And that I'll take on pretty much any job if the money's right."_

The two weeks she'd spent on board the Volt Cobra with Sana had passed in a blur, just a few individual moments clear in her mind: the thrill of action when they'd found themselves on the wrong side of a Rodian gang who seemed to think Sana owed them money, heart-stopping terror when they seemed to have triggered the security systems in the centuries-old archive Aphra had located, and then the nights on board the ship, the way their bodies had fit together.

And then, the return to Nar Shaddaa. Aphra had sold the location of the archive -- now missing a few of its more interesting relics -- to the highest bidder, for even more money than she had promised Sana. She had invited her back here to divide the proceeds.

_"There's your share." Aphra smiled at Sana as she transferred the credits._

_Sana raised her eyebrows at the extra amount, nodded curtly and stood up._

_"You're not going to stay for a drink?" She tried an even wider smile. "We can toast our future success."_

Aphra cringed, as she always did, at the memory of how desperate she must have come across.

_"It was fun, Aphra," Sana said. "But that's all it was."_

The worst was coming, Aphra's mind unable to avoid the memory unspooling all the way to the end.

_"You should learn to get over your crushes."_

She had reached the bottom of the glass, the geological dividing line that marked the boundary between the Pre-Sana and Sana eras.

Of course, now it was the post-Sana era. Aphra kept coming back to this bar; she told herself that it was because she refused to change her habits, but then she was good at lying to herself. The hope remained that Sana might walk in, and say--

"Can I buy you another drink?"

The girl wasn't Sana -- she was much shorter, for one thing -- but she was cute enough to escape an immediate withering put down.

"Why?" Aphra said.

"Your glass is empty. And you look like you could use some company."

"Oh, do I?" Aphra said with a hollow laugh.

"OK, _I_ could use some company. How's that sound?"

"You're sure I'm the sort of company you want?"

"Pretty sure, yeah." The girl smiled -- a broad, even infectious smile that reached her eyes, yet also came with just a hint of danger. "Coruscant Sunset, yeah?"

"Imperial Centre Sunset," Aphra corrected light-heartedly.

"The Hutts may stay just on the right side of the Empire," the girl said, "but the Y'Toub Sector's still technically independent. We get to use the old name." She was already heading to the bar.

* * *

The inevitable didn't feel inevitable to Aphra until the girl -- her name turned out to be Stocte, but a part of Aphra's mind had already labelled her "Rebound Girl" -- was actually back in her apartment with her. "Nice place," she said, looking around.

Aphra snorted. "You think?" It was little more than a climate controlled cargo compartment that had been fitted with some minimal furniture, an autofact with a very limited repertoire, and a bathroom that was even smaller than the one Aphra had shared with three other students in her university days.

"Not really," Stocte said. "But, y'know, by Nar Shaddaa standards. You're not sharing, right? 'Cos--"

"No, I'm not sharing," Aphra said, pleased by Stocte's relieved smile in response.

"I bet the rent's sky high, though."

"The landlord won some pod races a decade or so back," Aphra said. "Had a better idea than most what to do with the prize money."

"But where did you find the money to afford the rent?"

"A lucky gamble." It hadn't been a gamble, not really; it had been painstaking, careful research. Which she had then gambled on by persuading Sana to take her to the planet.

"You didn't seem very interested in the sabacc table back in the bar. That was a big match."

"There's more than one way to gamble."

"I guess there is." Stocte pulled on Aphra's forearms -- digging in quite hard with her nails, in fact -- to draw her closer to the bed. "So is this enough small talk now?"

"Yeah," Aphra said, then swallowed. "Yeah, I think it is."

They kissed, and fell onto the bed in a fumbling tangle of limbs, helping each other remove their clothes. Stocte ran her hand through Aphra's hair, pulling her head towards her to kiss her more deeply. She'd been growing it out for the last month, but this was the first time it had felt _nice_ to have longer hair.

But as they went on, Aphra's mind was tugged back to how things had been. The feeling of Stocte's skin under her fingers contrasted too sharply with Sana's, while the way her lips parted when Aphra kissed her was too similar, too much of a reminder of how things had been. Everything Stocte did just piled up the evidence towards the unanswerable charge of Not Being Sana. When Aphra finally came it wasn't because of Stocte's over-eager tongue on her clit, but the memory in her mind of how Sana had fucked her as though she was a virtuoso and Aphra her instrument.


	2. Chapter 2

The bleeping of the communications console woke Aphra from a tangled skein of dreams: sex and violence and flying all blurred into one.

She tried to get out of bed, but found her right arm trapped. Oh, right, Rebound-- Stocte, that was her name. She managed to extricate herself gently enough to avoid waking her up, more out of concern for her privacy in taking the call than allowing her lover to sleep.

Aphra pulled on her top so that at least the parts of her that would be visible would be clothed, and crossed to the console, rearranging her hair as she did so that the worst of its messiness was at least hidden behind her. Mornings were when she most often remembered why she'd liked to keep it short in the first place. When the screen lit up, though, she realised she needn't have bothered: the caller was a Twi'lek, so most likely he would find her hair deeply aesthetically unappealing, no matter how well-coiffed it was.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"Greetings, Doctor Aphra. I represent Grakkus the Hutt."

Aphra fiddled with her hair a little more, despite herself. "You've got my attention." Grakkus was known amongst his fellow Hutts as a strange creature who for some reason liked to walk around on mechanised legs. Among the rest of the denizens of the Y'Toub Sector, and far beyond, what marked him out was his interest in artifacts associated with the Force and its users, the vanished Jedi and the mysterious Sith. Many people Aphra's age or even older didn't even believe in the Force, but it was impossible to know as much as she did about Galactic history without being convinced there must be something to the legends.

"He has a business proposition for you."

"I get lots of business propositions," Aphra lied.

"A very lucrative one, if you are successful. He is assembling a small team to undertake a particular task. Your knowledge and skills would be most valuable."

"I'll be honest, I'm not great with teams," Aphra said.

"Your share of the proceeds would be in excess of eight thousand credits," he went on.

"Like I was saying, I love getting to meet new people."

The Twi'lek bared his sharpened teeth in amusement. "I'm transmitting coordinates for the meeting now. Be there in thirty minutes."

Aphra swore to herself. The only way to get there in time would be to hire a private speeder taxi. She wondered how Grakkus might turn out to feel about the idea of paying expenses. She dialled up the least unreliable company she knew of on the console while dressing herself properly.

"Huh? Whassgoinon?" Stocte said, waking halfway through Aphra's debate with the speeder people about a fair price. They had her over a plasteel cylinder and they knew it.

"I have to leave," Aphra said. "So you have to leave." She managed a half-smile. "Sorry."

Stocte simply started getting dressed and headed for the door, leaning up to kiss Aphra on the way out. "I'll see you again?"

"Maybe."

"I'll take maybe. Good luck with your urgent whatever-it-is, I guess."

* * *

The rendezvous location turned out to be one of Grakkus's warehouses, currently filled with nondescript cargo crates that Aphra was fairly sure mostly contained spice. The Twi'lek majordomo who had first made contact with her greeted her at the door, and took her to meet Grakkus himself.

"Doctor Aphra, it is a pleasure to meet you at last. I have been following your career with interest," Grakkus said. Her name was rendered odd to her own ears by the contrast with all the Huttese phonemes around it.

"Are you sure you've got the right person?" Aphra said. Her career so far consisted of little more than earning her doctorate and her adventure with Sana.

"Grakkus the Hutt does not make mistakes," the Twi'lek said.

"I'm not so sure about that," said a familiar voice from the next row of cargo containers over.

Aphra turned and saw Sana, as she had expected to. The reality of seeing her again hit her like a duranium hammer to the solar plexus. "I didn't know you were back on Nar Shaddaa," she managed to say eventually.

"There are enough people here who think they have the right to have a flight plan filed with them without you getting in on the act," Sana said.

Grakkus laughed. "Droid, you did not tell me they knew one another!" Sana and Aphra both looked behind Grakkus to see a strangely proportioned droid emerging from the shadows. "This is highly entertaining. Perhaps I should forget this mission, and see if I can persuade you two to fight in my arena."

"Who is this?"

"Captain Starros, Doctor Aphra," the Twi'lek said. "Allow me to present 8t88."

"Who?" Sana said.

"I've heard of you," Aphra said to the droid warily. "He's an information broker, very much of the 'I will sell to the highest bidder' persuasion," she added to Sana.

"My kind of droid," Sana said. But Aphra saw her hand going to her blaster.

Aphra turned back to 8t88. "What are you doing working for Grakkus?"

"The Hutt and I are working on a mutually beneficial business partnership--"

"Until he pays off his debt to me!" Grakkus said, laughing again.

"It is true that I have found myself temporarily embarrassed," the droid said. "However, when you discover that my information is correct, my share of the proceeds will be more than sufficient to extricate myself from this predicament."

"So what is your information?" Aphra asked.

"I have discovered," 8t88 announced grandly, "the location of the Lost Colony."

Aphra rolled her eyes. "That myth is probably older than hyperspace travel," she said. "And sure, some myths have something to them. But no one's _ever_ found the Lost Colony."

"Or they have found it, and never returned," 8t88 countered. "As the myth claims should be the case."

"What _is_ the Lost Colony?" Sana asked. "I mean, if I'm going to be flying us there, I think I have a right to know. Especially if you're supposed to never return. I'm not doing that for any number of credits."

"A self-sufficient enclave maintained by droids," Aphra said. "A utopia for any organic who can find it. That's the story anyway."

"And the never coming back thing?"

"A security measure, supposedly." Aphra turned to Grakkus. "I didn't think your interests extended to this sort of thing, though?"

"Very astute, Doctor Aphra," Grakkus said. "Tell them the rest, droid."

"Yes, 'Doctor' Aphra," 8t88 said, and Aphra could hear his scepticism about her qualifications in the modulation of his voice. "Most astute indeed. My information strongly suggests that the Colony is also the final resting place of Freedon Nadd's blaster. The real one, not one of the many counterfeits littering the galaxy."

Sana sighed. "I've regretted every other answer I've heard here today, but I suppose I should ask who Freedon Nadd is."

"Ancient Sith Lord," Aphra said. "Very nasty even by their standards. Killed a lot of people with the blaster." She turned to 8t88. "But again, I'm sceptical."

"I have no reason to disbelieve the droid," Grakkus said. "As part of his indenture to me, I have had him fitted with a restraining bolt. He simply cannot lie to me." Aphra winced; a droid like 8t88 would hate that. "But if it makes you feel better, I can send him with you."

"That was not our agreement!" 8t88 protested shrilly.

"It is now," Grakkus said. "Captain Starros, how long until your ship can be ready?"

"Within the hour," Sana said. "But I want my share of the money in advance."

"Me too," Aphra said instantly.

Grakkus laughed his disturbing laugh once more. "I agree to your terms, Captain." His laughter stopped suddenly. "After all, you are effectively providing a ... shall we say, a courier service? But you and the droid, Doctor, will be paid by results."

"The audience is over," the Twi'lek said as Grakkus retreated, his mechanical legs waddling backwards. "You will depart as soon as it is convenient."


	3. Chapter 3

Sana's docking pad turned out to be relatively close to where the meeting had been held. Aphra had thought about pretending there were things she needed to collect from her apartment, but prolonging the inevitable didn't seem worth it. They made their way to the _Volt Cobra_ without talking to each other, the stony silence between Aphra and Sana punctuated only by 8t88's occasional complaints that he should not be accompanying them.

As they approached the ship, however, a blaster shot fizzed through the air above them. Aphra and Sana instantly dropped to the floor, Sana unholstering her own blaster as they did so.

"Friends of yours?" Aphra said as a pair of humans approached.

"Funny, I was about to ask you the same thing."

They scrambled for cover behind a tower of half-unpacked cargo. 8t88 followed reluctantly. "We should proceed to the ship immediately."

"That's what we're trying to do!"

"I have access to information that these individuals are agents of the Empire."

"The Empire? On Nar Shaddaa?" Sana glanced around the corner and fired off a couple of shots with her blaster. "The Hutts won't be happy if they find out."

"Indeed not, but I do not believe this affects our present situation materially, as any retribution they might seek will be merely financial, and would take place long after our termination."

"Give me the blaster," Aphra said. When Sana just stared at her, she put out her hands. "Give me the blaster. I promise I'm not so upset you dumped me that I want to shoot you."

"I didn't exactly--"

"Give. Me. The. Blaster."

Sana handed it over reluctantly and Aphra went to the edge of their cover to glance at the current situation. She fired another shot, just to keep the pursuers on their toes. Then, as they grew closer, she turned the blaster to maximum. "Run!" she shouted to the other two. They did so, and as soon as they were clear, Aphra fired on the lowest cargo container in the stack they had been hiding behind. It vaporised instantly, causing the ones balanced on top of it to fall forward, trapping their pursuers.

"Neat trick," Sana said grudgingly. "Now give me back my blaster."

* * *

Once they were safely in hyperspace, heading for the co-ordinates 8t88 had only been willing to give once they were in space, Sana engaged the autopilot and turned to Aphra.

"I don't like this one bit," she said.

"That makes two of us," Aphra said. "This started off feeling like a well-paid wild goose chase."

"But if there are Imperial agents involved, there might be something to it?"

Aphra nodded.

8t88 walked into the cockpit. "Of course, our encounter was probably not unrelated to the subcutaneous tracking device in 'Doctor' Aphra's forearm," he observed mildly.

"The what now?" Sana said. "What are you mixed up in, Aphra? What does the Empire want with you? Are you working for that one-cred-ante rebel movement?"

"I have no idea what he's talking about. And I'm definitely not any sort of Rebel."

8t88 grabbed her arm between his talons and sent a small charge through her skin. The fizzing noise of the implant burning out was drowned out by Aphra's tirade of swearing.

She looked ruefully at the mild burn, exactly where Stocte had grabbed hold of her last night. "Damn, Rebound Girl." Aphra should have known better than to think that she'd just been interested in a good time. "She must have been working for the Empire."

Sana glared at her. "There was a Rebound Girl?"

"After a month!" Aphra retorted. "Not that it's any of your damn business," she added. "And besides, I bet you-- I don't want to know, to be honest."

"Wow, you really can't even work out what your argument is, can you?"

"Much the same could be said of the good 'Doctor's' thesis," 8t88 put in.

Sana laughed. "Look, I guess I just don't really think of myself as the sort of person people rebound off." The look she gave Aphra bordered on pitying, and Aphra hated it. "We had fun, Aphra. At least I thought we did. But that's all it was, just fun."

"I didn't have that much fun," Aphra said.

Sana gave her a challenging look. "Now I know you're lying."

"Do we really want to do this with the droid here?"

"Your organic mating rituals are of no concern to me," 8t88 said. "But I am willing to temporarily disengage my photoreceptors and audio transceivers if you wish. There is some information I am distinctly uninterested in collecting."

"This isn't a mating ritual," Sana said. She shot her most dangerous look in Aphra's direction. "It _isn't_."

Aphra leaned forward. "Oh yeah? 'Cos I'm getting hot, and I know you well enough to know that you are too."

There was a whirr as 8t88 made good on his promise to shut down his inputs.

"Damn you, Aphra," Sana said.

And then they were kissing, and it was every bit as glorious as Aphra remembered. She pulled Sana closer to her hungrily, hands snaking under her jacket. Sana moaned and pushed back against Aphra, groaning into her mouth.

They'd fucked in the cockpit before, more than once, but the presence of 8t88, even in this unresponsive form, was off-putting. They picked their way past him to the small chamber where Sana kept her bunk.

And then everything blurred together, in a single moment that Aphra wished could last forever: Sana's mouth on Aphra's breast, the ball of Aphra's hand pressing into her Sana's mound as her fingers crooked upwards inside her, lying back on the bed as Sana explored every millimetre of her body anew, moaning into each other's mouths as they came together.

* * *

Aphra woke in the middle of the night, the lambent blue of hyperspace still swirling around the ship. She left Sana sleeping and walked to the cockpit, sitting herself in Sana's chair. The quiet of it all was beautiful. How much of what she had missed of Sana had been the experience of spaceflight? She should try to get a ship of her own.

8t88 sprang to life behind her and began fiddling with the secondary controls in front of him.

Aphra turned around. "What are you doing?"

8t88 stopped. "Ah, 'Doctor' Aphra, I did not register you there. I had not expected you to be awake at this hour."

"So why set yourself to re-activate now?" Aphra asked.

"Is there anything I can help you with? Do feel free to say 'no'."

"I'm fine," Aphra said. "I'll just stay here and enjoy the view."

"As you wish," 8t88 said.

Aphra made sure she stayed awake until the morning, but 8t88 didn't touch the console again.


	4. Chapter 4

The planet 8t88 had brought them to was a desert, rendered different from all the many other desert planets in the galaxy only by occasional glittering patches on the surface. There had been war here, with high yield weapons that fused the sand into glass.

They put down on a plain whose only features were tiny ripples scoured by the wind, occasional sand dunes ... and a patrol vessel parked neatly a few hundred metres away from the _Volt Cobra_.

Aphra whistled. "That's a nice ship."

"Firespray's OK," Sana said. "If you're looking for a leisurely cruise to your destination."

"That looks like a fairly heavy duty hyperspace drive to me," Aphra said.

"Well, I see these things differently, what with having the fastest ship in the galaxy."

"I heard second fastest," Aphra said.

Aphra was disappointed that Sana didn't rise to the bait, given the way their argument last night had ended up. "Talk to us, droid," she said instead. "What's going on here?"

"The vessel must have arrived here recently," 8t88 said, "or it would have been buried by the sand. But even your primitive organic meatbrains could deduce that. We can assume that some other fortune hunter or hunters has followed the same clues that I did."

"That doesn't mean you're right," Aphra said. "Could just be that they're just as wrong as you are."

"I am not wrong," 8t88 said. He stalked off in the direction of the nearest dune.

Aphra and Sana exchanged a look and then followed.

"This sand dune is at a higher than ambient temperature in ways that cannot be readily accounted for," he said when they caught up with him. "My superior vision makes this abundantly clear. I also suspect that this is not a dune at all, but a holoprojection." He kept on walking -- if he was wrong, Aphra thought amusedly, he was going to get sand in all his servos. But he simply disappeared.

"Come on, then," Sana said reluctantly. They followed him through the unreal barrier into a realm picked out in shadows, only a small percentage of the harsh sunlight outside filtering through the projection.

There was a large door in front of them, looking more like a shuttle bay than anything else, with a control panel to one side. 8t88 walked over to it and began trying to slice into it. "This may take some time," he said. "I have a great deal of data regarding old systems but it is incomplete."

"Could this be it?" Sana said. "The Lost Colony?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," Aphra said.

"Stand back," 8t88 said curtly as its efforts finally bore fruit and the doors slid open, only to jam when the gap between them was only a few centimetres wide.

Aphra and Sana stood side by side to force them open. Eventually, they got past whatever blockage had been preventing them opening further. The pair stumbled into the chamber beyond, clutching onto one another for support as they fell forward.

Sana turned to the droid. "You could have helped."

"Without me, the door would not have opened at all."

"Well, I'm glad you're useful for something," Sana said.

"I assume that you believe that simply because I possess superior strength, I am obliged to utilise it in your service. I realise that this may be the attitude you are used to taking towards droids..."

Their argument faded from Aphra's awareness as she walked further from the doors and realised just how large the chamber they were in was. They stood on a large ledge -- there was a small shuttlecraft a few tens of metres or so away, and room for several more. Beyond the ledge the roof of an enormous cavern glowed with a warm yellow colour.

Aphra walked over to the edge as Sana and 8t88 continued to argue. When she looked over, she felt a momentary wave of dizzying vertigo at the sheer scale of what lay before her. The shuttle wasn't just for flying away from here, it was for going down to the enormous city below. During her studies, she had once experienced a full immersion holo about the ancient Gungan cities deep in the oceans of Naboo. It was the only thing that even came close to the sheer sense of scale. On Nar Shaddaa, you _knew_ that you were a long way from the moon's real surface, but with everything so crowded, the gaps between the buildings bustling with ships and speeders, it didn't really feel like it. Here, Aphra really did feel as though she might fall for hours.

"It's true," she said, quietly, wonderingly. Then she shouted to the others: "It's true! It's all true!"

Sana joined her and gave a low whistle.

8t88 made his way over more slowly. "I trust you will see now that my information can be relied upon."

* * *

There was just enough power in the ancient shuttle's cryogenic cells for Sana to be able to perform a controlled glide down to the cavern.

They disembarked into an eerie ghost city. The area they had landed in felt as though it was supposed to be a public square, but there was no one around. Everything was deathly quiet.

And then, from every direction, droids started to appear, in various states of disrepair. They all shared the same basic bipedal body plan, and a certain chunkiness about their torsos, but had clearly been patched and repaired many times over the long years they had waited down here.

One droid that was less battered than the others stepped forward. Its vocabulator stuttered into life. "In-- Int-- Interrogative: How may we serve you, Master?" Now that it was working again, its voice sounded almost too eager to please.

"Me?" Aphra said. "I'm your Master?"

"Affirmation: Of course, Master. All who come to the colony are tended for what remains of their natural lives by the droids there, who are only too happy to carry out their primary functions. Repetition: How may we serve you, Master?"

"Well, er, we're looking for a blaster."

"Shocked Statement: There are no weapons in the colony, Master. It is a utopia by design. A place of peace and tranquility for all organics."

"We heard it was here," Sana said, glaring at 8t88. "A very particular blaster."

"Conciliatory Reaffirmation: I am afraid you must be mistaken, Master," the droid said. "However, if you would care to be shown to your accommodations, we can take your droid here for maintenance."

"Er, no," Aphra said, "I think he should stay--"

"That is quite all right, Master," 8t88 said, suddenly sounding almost sickeningly servile. "I am happy to go with these droids. Perhaps I can determine how the misunderstanding has arisen."

"Very well, then," Aphra said to the droid. "Take us to our quarters."

* * *

"Wow," Sana said for the fifth time. The single room they were in was bigger than any dwelling Aphra had ever lived in, and was only one part of a suite that wouldn't be out of place in a residence for a senior diplomat on Coruscant.

"This isn't bad, is it?" Aphra said. "I can almost imagine being tempted to stay here forever."

"Speak for yourself," Sana said.

"So how long do you think it will be until 8t88 figures out what's going on?" Aphra said. "If he was right about this place, maybe he was onto something about Freedon Nadd's blaster too."

Sana sighed and put her hands on Aphra's hips. "Shall we just assume that it's long enough that I would eventually give in to your attempts to seduce me and skip to the good part?"

"My attempts to seduce you?"

"Don't deny it," Sana said.

"I won't," Aphra said. She kissed Sana. "Oh, yes, definitely the good part."

"I am curious about one thing," Sana said as they made their way across the room to the enormous bed.

"Ask away," Aphra said.

"What makes 8t88 say 'Doctor' like that when he's talking to you?" Sana asked. "You _are_ a doctor, aren't you?"

"I defended my thesis," Aphra said as they lay down. "But the blaster ended up being a lot less ceremonial than it was supposed to be."

"Oh?"

"It turned out my so-called advisor was planning to steal my ideas and take the credit. I didn't let her."

"I see. So you are a real archaeologist. I have to admit I wasn't sure. Albeit a rogue one, I suppose."

"I like the sound of that," Aphra said. "Rogue archaeologist."

"Come here and show me just how rogue you are," Sana said, pulling her in for another kiss.


	5. Chapter 5

"Doctor Aphra. Doctor Aphra. Kindly awaken, Doctor Aphra."

The voice was quiet, insistent, and unmistakably mechanical. That was enough to shock Aphra into being fully awake. "8t88? What are you doing here? And why aren't you being sarcastic about my title?"

"Doctor Aphra," 8t88 said, "what do you know of the HK series of droids?"

"The Old Republic isn't really my period," Aphra said, "but they were assassin droids, weren't they? The last ones were decommissioned over two millennia ago and a lot of technical data relating to them was destroyed, to try to prevent anyone recreating them because they had a tendency to kill their Masters--" Aphra suddenly remembered what the droid they had first met had said about fulfilling their primary functions. "Wait a minute, are you saying what I think you're saying?"

"It may not surprise you to learn that I have had access to some of the supposedly missing specifications. I was unable to be certain at first, since these droids are so damaged, but I am now confident that certain geometrical features of the head assemblage match the HK series."

"So what, some of these ancient droids escaped being purged and took up residence in the Lost Colony to give themselves a nice steady supply of 'Masters' to kill? This is their ... retirement home?"

"I doubt this is a true Lost Colony," 8t88 said. "The legend may even have been true, once, on some forgotten planet. But once it was an established concept in Galactic culture, how easy it would to use it as a lure?" 8t88 sounded almost chagrined that he hadn't thought of it for himself.

"So this whole place was built as a trap? That's some dedication."

"They have had thousands of years," 8t88 said. "Without a memory wipe. They may have become confused at times between the deception and the reality."

"And I suppose no real Lost Colony means no Sith Lord blaster either?"

"I would not like to rely on it, no," 8t88 said.

Aphra rolled over and shook Sana awake.

"What is it?" she said blearily. Then, shocked, "What is _he_ doing here?"

"He's here to tell us that we've walked into a trap laid by millennia-old murder droids." Aphra was already pulling on her clothes.

"OK, so we fight our way past them to the blaster--"

"There is no blaster," Aphra said.

"A most regrettable circumstance," 8t88 said in response to Sana's glare.

Sana sighed as she began to dress herself. "All right, let's get out of--"

Suddenly, the door opened, revealing three of the HK units, led by the one who had greeted them on their first arrival. "Concerned Query: You aren't thinking of leaving already, are you, Masters?" The droid hoisted a blaster rifle. "Unnecessary Addendum: We believe the legend was quite specific about entry into the Lost Colony being strictly one-way."

Aphra and Sana reached under their pillows for their blasters and levelled them at the droids. They fired but nothing happened.

"Smug Statement: You didn't really think your blasters would still be functional, did you? They had been rendered inoperational long before your droid sliced into our--"

8t88 unleashed a miniature lightning storm of ionic charge. The HK units screamed in pain and collapsed to the floor.

"Thank you," Aphra said with feeling.

"You couldn't have done something a little sooner?" Sana asked.

"We must make haste," 8t88 said. "There are many more units in the colony."

Aphra and Sana both put their hand on the downed droid's blaster rifle at the same time. "After you," Aphra said with exaggerated politeness.

"No, after you, I insist," Sana said.

"You just want me in the lead as your human shield."

"As if."

"The other droids were most likely also armed," 8t88 pointed out testily.

Aphra let Sana take the rifle and found a small blaster on the furthest droid. She fired it experimentally at a piece of furniture on the other side of the large room, and it went up in flames. "You might not have belonged to Freedon Nadd, but you'll do," she said to it.

Another HK droid appeared at the door; they all fired simultaneously and it disintegrated messily.

"How are we going to get out of here?" Aphra asked as they made their way through the corridors of the habitation complex their suite had been within.

"The shuttle we came down in was completely out of juice," Sana said. "You did slice into their system, didn't you?" she asked 8t88. "Were there any others?"

"Negative," 8t88 said.

"So we need to recharge it," Aphra said.

"Easier said than done."

"It may be possible," 8t88 said. "This entire complex is powered by a fusion reactor. If its output could be diverted--"

"Joyous Statement: Die, meatbags!"

They whirled round to the droid that had appeared behind them. This one had a working shield unit, but it didn't take long for their combined firepower to overload it.

"OK, we head for the shuttle," Aphra said, and set off down the corridor at a jog.

"Wait," Sana said.

Aphra came back reluctantly. Sana nodded at the open door of another suite.

The sight inside was revolting; a charred corpse lying where it had fallen under the assault of a flame thrower.

"I guess that's the owner of the other ship up there," Aphra said.

"What an incisive deductive mind you have," 8t88 said. "We really must concentrate on leaving."

* * *

They fought their way back to the plaza they had first landed in. Unsurprisingly, a large number of HK units had converged on the area, cutting off their escape.

They retreated and 8t88 led them into a nearby maintenance area. They blasted a pair of HKs who had been working in it and 8t88 set to work on the console.

"They'll be coming for us," Sana said. "We can't stay here."

"On the contrary," 8t88 said. "We are going to kill two mynocks with one projectile." His voice sounded more strained than usual, as though most of his attention was devoted to interfacing with the colony's systems.

Four HK units appeared at the door, chattering merrily about terminations of hostilities and bringing peace and tranquility. Aphra and Sana fired repeatedly, ducking as the droids returned fire.

"I may require you to cover me for a few moments longer," 8t88 allowed once the attackers had exploded.

In the event, they had to survive nearly five minutes of beating back waves of attacking droids before 8t88's efforts paid off. But then, suddenly, huge electrical arcs flowed up and down the main thoroughfares of the colony even as all the lights in the buildings shorted out. The remaining HKs twitched spasmodically before exploding or collapsing to the ground. In the end, the only light came from the control deck of the shuttle itself.

"I have had to overload the power cell," 8t88 said. "It cannot hold this charge for long. We must hurry."

They ran to the shuttle and Sana took off before the docking ramp was closed or Aphra had had a chance to sit down. "Come on, come on," she muttered to herself over and over again as she coaxed it to into a spiralling ascent, trading off the risk of blowing the power cell by putting too much strain on the engines against its limited life. Aphra knew better than to disturb her.

They didn't so much land on the ledge above as crash into it, the shuttle's nose gouging a deep furrow in its surface.

"This thing's going to blow!" Sana said, already running out the back of the shuttle. Aphra and 8t88 followed her out onto the ledge and then, at even greater pace, through the still open doors. They had just emerged from the holoprojection when the shuttle exploded. The projection collapsed instantly, revealing that the entrance had completely caved in as a result of the explosion.

"Most invigorating," 8t88 said. "Do remind me to stay well away from such places in the future, and restrict myself to trading information."

"What are we going to tell Grakkus?" Sana asked.

"I'm not planning on telling him anything," Aphra said. "I'll stay well away from Nar Shaddaa until this has all blown over."

"What? But ..."

Aphra walked over to the Firespray patrol vessel that had previously been owned by the unfortunate victim they had seen down below. "It's like I said when I first met you: I need a ship." She smiled broadly. "And now I've got one." She rubbed a layer of sand away from the name plate. "The _Ark Angel_."

"I thought--"

"It was fun, Sana," Aphra said, "but that's all it was." A lie, but then Aphra was getting very good at lying. She might stay with Sana now, it might even be more than fun for a while, but it wouldn't last, and who knew when an opportunity like this would present itself again? She got out a tunneller and attached it to the Firespray's lock, setting it to try some of the more likely override codes first.

"May I prevail upon you for the journey back to Nar Shaddaa?" 8t88 asked Sana. "You have already been paid, I believe."

"I suppose so," Sana said. "Get on board."

Aphra followed them. Sana looked back at her, and Aphra thought that there might just be the tiniest hint of hurt and confusion on her face. "Are you coming or not?" Sana asked.

"Not," Aphra said. "But a word of advice: don't trust him."

"I don't."

"I mean it. He set this whole thing up."

"You have no--" 8t88 began, but Aphra cut him off.

"Maybe not the whole thing. The HK droids were here long before he was ever assembled. But he knew that's what we were coming for. I imagine he thought he could slice into their central system and make them into some sort of private droid army."

"Imperial droids are becoming frustratingly difficult to subvert, it's true," 8t88 said mournfully.

"But what about the debt to Grakkus?" Sana asked. "The restraining bolt?"

"All part of the deception; I imagine he shorted the bolt out at the moment it was inserted. He let Grakkus think he had the better of him so that Grakkus would helpfully set things up for him to make his move. Dangle the prospect of Freedon Nadd's blaster and the old slug would have done anything. I suppose even the complaining about being sent with us was a put on, wasn't it? Maybe even all those 'Imperial agents' were really working for you?"

"My complaints about your organic mating rituals were, on the other hand, quite genuine."

Aphra caught Sana looking at her, then, and looked back with as emotionless expression as she could manage. From the way Sana's lip quivered, she doubted she was managing very well. When the door of the Firespray hissed open, Aphra was finally forced to look away.

"How did you know?" 8t88 asked Aphra.

"It's like you said, I have an incisive deductive mind. And I know droids, I guess. Even the criminal kind. Especially the criminal kind." She gave Sana a serious look. "Take him back to Nar Shaddaa by all means, but then stay well away from him."

"I should leave you here to rust," Sana said.

8t88 made a strange noise that might have been the droid equivalent of a huff. "I suppose I might be willing to pay you extra for your trouble."

"How much extra?" Sana held up a hand to 8t88. "I'll warn you now, you need to be talking at least five figures."

"Goodbye, then," Aphra said.

"Aphra--"

"Goodbye, Sana. It _was_ fun."

Aphra walked over to her new ship, glancing behind her to see Sana and the droid arguing their way on board the _Volt Cobra_.

She was sat in the cockpit, still working out the basics of the controls, when Sana took off. She set the viewscreen to track the _Volt Cobra_ until it winked away into hyperspace.

Aphra kissed her fingers and placed them against the point on the screen where Sana's ship had last been. She could feel another layer accreting in her personal archaeology, washed by her tears. But now for the first time, a future stretched ahead of her with the freedom to roam the whole galaxy.

Aphra dried her eyes and initiated the take-off sequence.


End file.
